Friday, April 24, 2015

France: PM Valls sees anti-Semitism as only one of multiple hatreds

France’s Prime Minister Manuel Valls has announced an action plan
that will make the battle against hatred into “a great national cause,” a
plan that will include awareness programs and enhanced punishment for
online hate speech, with stiffer prison sentences for hatred-based
crimes. The superficially admirable plan springs from honest outrage on
Valls’ part — but outrage that has undergone a disquieting sea change
since it was first expressed.

After the Charlie Hebdo and kosher-supermarket massacres in
January, you may recall, Valls delivered a passionate, widely circulated
speech on anti-Semitism in France, declaring the problem of Jewish
flight so serious the French Republic must be judged a failure if Jews
left en masse. Then, Valls pulled no punches regarding the source of the
crisis: “We are at war with terrorism, jihadism and Islamist
radicalism.”

That January cri du coeur offered truths that were the gift
of spontaneity. With time for second thoughts (and who knows what
political pressure), the message Valls now delivers is quite different.
Last week the prime minister told suburban high school students:
“Racism, anti-Semitism, hatred of Muslims, of foreigners and homophobia
are increasing in an unbearable manner in our country.” He added,
“French Jews should no longer be afraid of being Jewish and French
Muslims should no longer be ashamed of being Muslims.

Valls’ capitulation to France’s pre-Hebdo default of moral
relativism is sad to behold. Valls’ outrage now sees anti-Semitism not
as a singular problem, rather as only one of multiple hatreds, and no
more distressing than hatred of foreigners (who?), gays and — of course
— Muslims.

The truth, which Valls understood very well in January, is that there is
no hatred for any group in France equivalent to that of Jew hatred,
routinely expressed in virulent hate speech, vandalism, beatings and
murder. Foreigners, gays and Muslims are not fleeing France. The
institutions of foreigners, gays and Muslims are not being guarded
around the clock. Fifty-five per cent of hate-driven acts are not
happening to foreigners, gays and Muslims, but to Jews (1% of the
population). More.